This invention relates to food compositions containing low calorie edible oil substitutes.
In recent years the associated health problems of arteriosclerosis and obesity have raised much concern about the high fat content of the average American diet. The typical edible fats and fatty oils found in the diet are made up predominantly of triesters of glycerol with fatty acids and are known as triglycerides. Customarily triglycerides that are solid at ambient temperatures are called fats, while those that are liquid are known as oils.
As a result of these health concerns, an increasingly calorie-conscious public has shown great interest in "diet", "lite", and "low calorie" formulations of highly caloric, edible fat-containing food compositions. Examples of these foods include cakes, ice cream, confectionery, salad oil, mayonnaise, margarine, potato chips, snack foods, and prepared culinary mixes (for cakes, icings and the like). Many of the diet formulations of these foods are based on dilution with air or water, with a corresponding reduction in the perceived quality of the food. A more attractive alternative is to reduce the fat-related caloric intake by a modification of the fat so as to reduce or prevent the absorption of fat-derived calories.
According to Mattson and Nolen (J. Nutr., 102, p. 1171, 1972) "the absorbability of a fat is determined by two processes, hydrolysis in the lumen of the intestinal tract and the subsequent absorption of the digestion products." One approach to this problem would be to re-engineer conventional fats so as to reduce their susceptibility to intestinal hydrolysis. Without this hydrolysis the fat would not be in the form required for intestinal absorption and would simply pass through the body unchanged. If nothing were absorbed, the material would be non-caloric. Such an approach is taught by Mattson and Volpenhein in U.S. Pat. No. 3,600,186, which shows the use of sugar fatty acid esters having at least four fatty acid ester groups. These esters are said to have the physical properties of ordinary triglyceride fats, but are not absorbed to the same extent owing to a low rate of hydrolysis by intestinal lipase enzymes.
A similar approach is taught by Hamm in U.S. Pat. No. 4,508,746. In this case tricarballyic acid esters of long-chain alcohols are used as low-calorie edible oil substitutes. These esters are also poorly absorbed owing to a low rate of hydrolysis in the intestine during digestion.
Both of these compounds are reported to have satisfactory organoleptic properties for use in food formulation and preparation. Unfortunately, ingestion of significant amounts of either compound can result in an undesired "laxative" effect, namely, leakage of the liquid material through the anal sphincter (D. J. Hamm, J. Food Science, 49, p. 419, 1984). This "anal leakage" problem seems to be the inevitable result of the ingestion of an oily material with limited digestibility.
What is needed is a low calorie, edible oil substitute that has the properties of a triglyceride oil when ingested, but that is altered by the gastrointestinal tract to a non-oily physical state so as to avoid anal leakage.